Please explain your logic. I do not believe you understand the rules regarding duopolies. Whether a station operates on a VHF or UHF channel -- or even what its PSIP is -- has no bearing on that.
Read the
Wikipedia article on the subject. It is surprisingly accurate.
Here is the relevant point: Up to two television stations in the same media market may be co-owned if either the service areas of the stations do not overlap,
or at least one of the stations is not rated among the top four rated stations in the media market.
Which band the station transmits on is not a factor for determining if a duopoly can be allowed. Nor does the PSIP channel. VHF
vs. UHF is only considered in how a station group's nationwide coverage is calculated.
Nothing more.
Again ... as I said earlier (and which you attempted to disprove with your original post), because the existing Nexstar stations in L.A., NYC, and S.F. are affiliates of The CW, they are
not among the top four stations in the ratings ... as is the case in pretty much every television market -- and certainly all of the major markets -- the ratings toppers are stations affiliated with ABC, CBS, Fox or NBC. Therefore, they could acquire the ABC stations in those markets.
I will not bring Nexstar's current legal problem with WPIX into the discussion because it has no bearing on the duopoly question.
But I
will bring a real-world example into play which completely proves the above and disproves your misunderstanding of the rules regarding duopolies: In Los Angeles, where CBS already owned KCBS/2, they purchased KCAL/9 in 2002 ... more than
two decades ago. Both are "below channel 14" by your definition, yet the FCC did not block the sale, nor have they moved to reverse it.
Your honor, I rest my case.